


Field Trip

by Cassiopeia_Kass



Category: Andromeda (TV)
Genre: Escape, Inconvenient sexual tension, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2001-09-22
Updated: 2001-09-22
Packaged: 2021-03-02 00:27:04
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,177
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23962324
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Cassiopeia_Kass/pseuds/Cassiopeia_Kass
Summary: Getting out once in a while can be good for you.
Relationships: Seamus Harper/Dylan Hunt
Kudos: 4





	Field Trip

**Author's Note:**

> (This is [Viridian5](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Viridian5) posting for Cassiopeia, a friend of mine who's long gone out of fandom but left me as a kind of caretaker of her _Andromeda_ fics. They've been linked at my personal site for a very long time but I wanted to share them with the fandom more.)

Dylan Hunt had occasionally regretted his height and breadth, but only occasionally. This was one of those occasions. Arrested for seditious activity on a planet that had long since lost the capability for interplanetary flight, locked into an uncomfortably small prison cell, and only able to escape through the air ducts.

With Harper.

Harper, of course, fit rather neatly into the duct as they moved through it in near darkness, while Dylan felt as if he was being squeezed through some kind of tube. 

"Up here," Harper whispered and, thank whatever gods there might be, the goddamn duct opened into a wider space. Unfortunately, it went up, not out, and Harper stood up, peering upward.

Somehow, Dylan managed to stand up facing Harper. Although that wasn’t quite right, he wasn’t facing Harper, he was up close in Harper’s personal space with barely a hand’s breadth between them. He could feel Harper radiating heat and annoyance in equal measures. "Now what?" he asked, a little irascibly.

"There should be an access ladder up there. Damn, I wish they hadn’t taken my belt." Harper scowled up into the dimness as if it had personally offended him. "I had a light on it."

Dylan rubbed his forehead, avoiding the spot where he’d gotten smacked by a truncheon. "All right. Just hold still, I’m going to try and climb up there."

"And how are you planning to do that?" Harper sounded genuinely interested.

"Watch." Dylan pressed himself hard against the duct, braced a foot on either side of Harper and basically shimmied upward. 

Harper watched with more of that apparently genuine interest. "Want me to get underneath and push?"

Dylan stopped, breathing a little harder than he would have liked; he wasn’t working out the way he should be, obviously, because it was a lot harder than he remembered it being the last time he’d gone through this exercise in training. Of course, that had been longer ago than he cared to remember. "I don’t think so," he growled and turned his head to wipe his forehead on his sleeve. Without sweat in his eyes, he could see a little better, and hell if Harper wasn’t right. There was the damn ladder. "I see it." He glanced down again, unfortunately; Harper’s face was just about level with the juncture of his thighs and Harper appeared to be regarding his groin with the interest he’d shown for Dylan’s method of locomotion. 

No, with more interest. He saw the pink tip of Harper’s tongue for a moment....

He had to be imagining things, and even if he wasn’t, this was hardly the time to be noticing Harper’s errant gaze or wondering what went on in that complicated head. Looking up, he reached out, caught the last rung of the ladder with one hand and hoisted himself, not without some degree of difficulty, threw the other hand up for the second rung and hoisted again.

Goddamned Tyr could probably do this without breaking a sweat. He _had_ to work out more. 

And he had to figure out a way to pull Harper up. It took a moment of thought and more hoisting, and he was going to kill himself doing it, damned if he wasn’t. Some complicated maneuvering and he leaned down, straddling the second rung and reaching down with both hands. "Okay, Harper," effortfully, "Grab on."

"Are you nuts?" Harper blinked up at him.

He was going to thump Harper in the head if they got out of here. "Probably. Now grab my hands." 

Harper gave him a doubtful look. "What if you drop me? I could get hurt that way."

"Harper." His voice sounded like he was strangling. "Can we hurry it up here before they figure out how we got out?"

"No way." Harper began to climb the same way _he_ had.

Rather ungratefully, he noted that Harper was better at it. More maneuvering and he started to climb the ladder, which ended at another horizontal branch of the system. He paused, nearly jumped out of his skin when Harper tapped his leg. 

"Thought you were in a hurry, Boss."

He ground his teeth together. "I hate to say it, but we’re going to have to switch places. You know where we’re going and I don’t." Harper had managed to plug in, however briefly, to the computer core that ran the prison.

"Good point." Harper somehow managed to climb up to the rung on which Dylan rested. "Hold on, I’m just going to sort of--" Harper hummed tunelessly for a moment, thinking about whatever he was just going to sort of do, and then _climbed_ Dylan.

Which wouldn’t have been so bad if he hadn’t ended up noticing how Harper smelled. Although he couldn’t really blame Harper and he really couldn’t blame himself, not with his nose ending up in Harper’s armpit as Harper hauled himself up and over and into the duct.

He hauled himself up after Harper and followed. Unfortunately, there were service lights on this stretch of duct, and he could see Harper’s compact body in front of him this time. He could see Harper’s compact _ass_. So he concentrated on just moving, thought about Magog, thought about how they were going to get back to the Maru without getting arrested again, especially since their weapons had been confiscated. He thought about how Beka was likely to react if they hadn’t returned on schedule. He thought about what supplies they were going to need, and whether or not they were going to be able to get everything on the list he’d just created in his head.

He thought, in other words, about everything but Harper right up until the moment he bumped into him. "What?" Irascibly again.

"Wait a minute." Harper hummed again. "This way."

Dylan blinked and realized they were at an intersection. "You’re sure?"

"I’m sure," Harper said confidently and moved in that direction.

He regretted his tone immediately. It wasn’t fair to be irritable with Harper, none of this was Harper’s fault, and Harper hadn’t blamed him, despite the fact that it was, more or less, _his_ fault for even mentioning the Commonwealth on a world which had forgotten the Commonwealth ever existed. It wasn’t Harper’s fault he had a rather fetching wriggle as he crawled, or that he smelled good, even slightly sweaty from exertion.

And he wasn’t going to think about that, so he went back to considering supplies.

They soon approached another vertical shaft, which wasn’t precisely the best news, but at least he could stand up again; his knees were really starting to ache and Dylan was beginning to think he was developing claustrophobia.

He and Harper faced each other again. "Okay," Harper said and looked up. "We need to get that hatch open and then there’s another ladder, and we’ll be out on the service level."

"Which means?"

Harper blinked. "Ground level."

Dylan looked up. The hatch was just out of reach. Dammit. "Okay."

"I can get the hatch, but I’m gonna need a little help." Harper said. "Once I get up there, I need you to kind of hold on to me so I don’t fall on my head."

Once he got up there-- Dylan sighed. "Harper, just climb up--here, get your arms around my neck."

Harper studied him, nodded, and obeyed.

Harper might look small, but he was surprisingly solid. "How much do you weigh?" he asked Harper, eye to eye.

Harper blinked again. "Um, I think about 65 kilos."

He could do that. If he could bench-press his own weight, he could lift Harper. Especially if Harper was bracing himself against the duct and using that lift as impetus rather than merely relying on it. Putting his hands under Harper’s ass--do _not_ think about that as Harper’s ass--he lifted, and Harper inched up, and damn if it wasn’t working.

Harper stretched upward. "Hang on--okay, can you sort of move over this way?" 

Dylan obeyed. 

There was something decidedly bizarre about the fact that he had his face against Harper’s bare stomach. Not only didn’t he mind, God help him, his cock had decided to wake up and take an inappropriate interest in the proceedings. Not that he intended to be ruled by his genitals, mind, and it was probably just that a) Harper smelled really, really good, and b) Dylan could have put his tongue into Harper’s navel if he chose. Which he didn’t. 

It really _had_ been too long since he’d had sex with anyone but himself.

"Little higher," Harper said, a little effortfully.

Which only succeeded in reminding him that he had two handsful of Harper’s ass. Bracing himself, he lifted again, feeling every damned muscle he owned, and Harper inched up again, braced on the duct and then suddenly, Harper’s legs were over his shoulders, Harper made a triumphant sound and good God, he’d thought it was bizarre to have his face in Harper’s belly.

This... this was beyond bizarre. Especially when Harper, intent on his struggle to open the hatch, began to wriggle.

"Hold still!" As an order, it lacked strength, probably because his face was in between Harper’s thighs.

Harper stilled immediately. "Um, sorry, but, um, you’re breathing on me." Harper’s tone was apologetic.

Dylan closed his eyes and thought about Sirenian arthopods spawning. "I can’t _not_ breathe, Harper--just get the damn hatches open."

"I’m working on it." A little plaintively.

There was no place to turn his head, Dylan thought wrathfully. He tried to think of nothing at all, to go back to thinking about supplies; while it was interesting to note that Harper appeared to dress left, it something he rather thought he had no business knowing. Or feeling. Or breathing on, particularly when it rapidly became apparent that Harper was very sensitive about someone breathing on him there.

Counting backward from one hundred helped a little, but Harper made a strangled, frustrated sound, lifted and flexed, and that blew whatever number he was counting right out of his brain. It was virtually impossible not to notice that Harper’s cock, at least, seemed to like him breathing on it, and it was equally impossible not to notice that _his_ cock approved of Harper’s cock liking him breathing on it, and gripping Harper’s ass while Harper flexed and lifted made him want to know what it might feel like without the obstacles of clothing, and dear God, he was losing his mind. Matters might very well have gone to hell from there except that Harper made another sound, this one victorious, and then Harper’s weight was off his hands and he narrowly escaped getting kicked in the head--not that he didn’t deserve it, he thought miserably--and Harper was suddenly peering down at him. 

"Got it," Harper said unnecessarily.

"Go," Dylan said, a little breathlessly, and managed to get his own ass up into the shaft to the ladder.

Thank Harper and various divinities, they were outside in the damp evening air of Cytos in a very short time. The prison rested on the very outskirts of the city, which was both good and bad, because the Maru was hidden in undergrowth on the opposite side of the city, but they could stay the hell out of the city while getting there.

The cold air had a bracing effect on his damned out of control imagination, and it took some focus and concentration to find their way through the thickly wooded countryside. When the sirens went off in the city, Harper froze and Dylan had to yank him out of stasis.

"They figured out we’re gone," Harper muttered. "I’m good, I’m good."

"They’ll look for us in the city first," Dylan told him and looked up at the sky. Without a chron or weapons, he was using the night sky to steer them and hoped to God he was right; the damn Cytosians had confiscated everything but his uniform jacket. 

He thought about that a few moments later when he heard Harper’s teeth chattering. Dammit, dammit, dammit-- "Wait a minute," he said, working the fastenings on his jacket.

"What?"

He got his jacket off, put it over Harper’s shoulders. "Put that on."

Harper balked. "What about you?"

"My shirt’s warmer than yours." He reckoned it was true, given that Harper was wearing two short-sleeved shirts.

Harper seemed to consider that. "Okay, but just for a while. You might need it."

Riiiiigggght. But he smiled, unseen, in the darkness anyway. "Get moving." 

They toiled through the night for perhaps another hour or so, and then it became apparent that the Cytosians were broadening the search. The lights of the city that were visible to the west were joined by airborne searchlights. Happily, the Cytosians seldom left their cities, and apparently seldom tested the wilderness outside city walls.

"Think they’ll come this far?" Harper asked a little breathlessly.

"I’d guess not. But I wouldn’t bet on it." Dylan looked ahead, looked at the city again. "I’d also guess we’re about halfway there."

"Assuming they haven’t found the Maru," Harper muttered.

"Right." Dylan put a hand on Harper’s shoulder, which was not a good idea, the warmth and solidity of muscle and bone reminded him too much of--things he was not going to allow himself to think about. "Let’s get moving."

Harper nodded, his face a pale smudge in the darkness.

A treacherous part of Dylan’s mind wondered if the rest of Harper would glow like that in the night and he stumbled, reached to steady himself on Harper’s shoulder and Harper likewise tripped and fell.

He landed on Harper, unfortunately.

"Oooof." Harper sounded a little more breathless. "Ouch."

"Sorry," he breathed, getting his own breath, and things just kept getting weirder, Harper’s hair tickled his face and he could smell whatever it was that Harper used on it, something citrusy and fragrant, in addition to the increasingly alluring scent of Harper exerting himself.

Pheromones, he thought blankly, and his hips pressed down against Harper’s ass just as Harper tried to draw his knees up underneath himself.

Cytosians. Sirenian arthopods. Cold showers. And his face was pressed against Harper’s hair, he could lick the curve of Harper’s ear if he so chose.

He was up on and on his feet as if he’d gotten an electric shock, tugging Harper up with a distinct lack of grace. 

Harper, blessedly, was silent for once in his life, and fell into step behind him without so much as a mutter.

It wasn’t that his shirt was warmer than Harper’s, he felt like he’d been standing in front of a heat source and silently thanked the universe for the fact that it was night. He felt redder than those horrible pants of Harper’s.

Senility, that had to be it, he was, after all, over 300 years old; it had to be senility. They were in very real jeopardy, for God’s sake, and he was noticing how warm Harper’s skin was.

Whatever the case, they made good time after that, and stayed about an arm’s length from one another almost by unspoken agreement. Even with rest periods, they reached the Maru before dawn. Harper was limping by that time, something he hadn’t seen in the dark.

"What’s wrong?" he asked, once the lock was closed.

"Turned my ankle," Harper said wearily. "And I think I’m getting a blister."

Dylan crouched. "Let me have a look."

"It’s not a sprain," Harper protested, "It’s just a little sore."

Dylan scowled up at him and began undoing Harper’s boot. 

Harper sighed and sank down to sit on the deck, clearly resigned. 

With the sock off, there didn’t seem to be any swelling, which was good, and Dylan ran his fingers firmly over the top of Harper’s foot and the ankle, checking for give where there shouldn’t be any. Harper had been right, there was a broken blister on his heel, but that needed little more than antibiotic ointment and dermaseal. So why, he wondered distantly, was he still holding Harper’s foot with his fingers over Harper’s ankle, fingertips resting on the point where Harper’s pulse sped?

Harper seemed hardly to be breathing, and his eyes were very wide. Dylan stroked the smooth skin behind Harper’s ankle joint and looked into those eyes, distantly noticed that Harper’s pupils were dilated.

"Um," Harper said faintly. "Shouldn’t we get out of here?"

Dylan blinked. "Yes, of course," he said hastily and dropped Harper’s foot like it was hot. Which, weirdly, was true. He headed for the pilot’s chair, uncomfortably aware that a) he was undoubtedly scarlet, and b) that his cock had again woken up and taken an interest in the fact that he was pawing Harper’s foot and ankle. 

Without interplanetary flight, the only danger lay from anti-aircraft measures, but if they lifted off quickly enough, they could be out of atmosphere before the Cytosians could activate those. He focused on that, only half listening to Harper moving behind him.

Liftoff was simple, navigation was simpler, and then they were out of atmosphere out of the blue and into the black and by God, they were going to reach the meetpoint early after all. A small part of his mind pointed out that getting there early could be a good opportunity to-- and he began counting backward from 100 again.

Slipstream required focus, and when he’d cleared his mind, he took them into it, emerged in normal space and time at Ghiradelli’s Belt, the Maru hanging alone and solitary in space.

"We’re here," Harper said, and Dylan nearly leapt out of the pilot’s chair.

He took in a steadying breath, let it out. "Yeah. We’re here."

Harper had taken off his jacket and was holding it out to him. "I’m, um, going to take a quick shower, if that’s okay." 

Sirenian arthropods. Magog. Nightsider young. "Go ahead," he said.

Harper jerked his head in a quick nod. "I’ll, um, leave you some hot water."

He blinked. "Great, great." Suddenly cheerful. He could take care of things under the hot water, maybe. Or not. Maybe a cold shower was better. Entertaining sexual fantasies about his engineer was just... wrong. Wasn’t it?

Setting the controls, he got up and went to the small galley to make a pot of coffee. On the other hand, Harper’s pupils had been dilated. Anyone with a primary school science education knew what that meant. He had a lot more than a primary school science education.

The sound of the shower was driving him crazy. He took off his boots, padded barefoot over the cold deck with his cup of coffee. Images of Harper under the spray kept appearing stubbornly in his head, Harper’s body, Harper’s mouth. He hadn’t allowed himself to think about Harper’s mouth before this. Shouldn’t be allowing it now. Shouldn’t be thinking about Harper naked or the fact that breathing on Harper had gotten Harper hard.

The image of Harper’s cock lifting to his hand was what finally drove him over the edge. Coffee and clothes left abandoned, he invaded Harper’s shower and the rush of blood from brain to cock nearly made him dizzy.

Harper made a small sound, not quite startled, and Harper was pleasuring himself. Harper took one look at him and made room in the shower stall, reached out and took hold of Dylan’s hand to tug him farther in.

Hot mouth, hot Harper, and he groaned, sucked on Harper’s tongue. Awkward angle and he moved down Harper’s body and sank to his knees. Harper had very nice nipples, very responsive nipples, and Harper’s belly seemed almost as sensitive, Harper clutched at him as if afraid Dylan would change his mind and leave, and that was reassurance to the part of his brain that still seemed to be operating on some plane of sanity.

He tongued Harper’s navel, sucked at it, and Harper’s cock pressed against him, hot and thick, and a part of him was distantly amused to note that Harper was surprisingly well endowed for a guy more than a head shorter than Dylan.

Of course, Harper would have to be gagged to remain silent, but that only added to the heat. "Fuck, Dylan, oh, jeez, god," and then Harper was reduced to whimpering when Dylan took hold of Harper’s cock and sucked at the tip. Nearly wordless, broken repetitions of Dylan’s name and he licked and teased the slit with his tongue before just swallowing Harper down.

He had one hand cupping Harper’s balls and one hand holding Harper’s ass, and Harper was slippery with shower gel, which was excellent, excellent, he slid his fingertips into the cleft between Harper’s buttocks and moved down. He could feel Harper trembling, and Harper’s fingers found his hair, tightened in it, and that worked very nicely to keep Harper on his feet when Dylan slipped a finger into heat and tightness and pressed upward. Harper’s balls were tight, drawn up against his body, and he was going to get what he wanted, God. He’d forgotten the taste of cock, the feel of it, and while it was unsettling to realize that he’d wondered how Harper might taste, it was entirely satisfying to find out.

Harper stiffened, made a strangled sound and flooded his mouth and throat, and Dylan swallowed, working his throat, nose pressed up against wet, coarse curls, drinking Harper down, a second finger joining the first and Harper was going to collapse, he could feel it and gentled his mouth, let Harper gradually slip from between his lips. 

Nearly bent over him, Harper whimpered. Reluctantly, Dylan withdrew his fingers, too aware of the throb of his own pulse between his legs. Even his face felt heavy and stiff, swollen with need, but Harper was wobbling. Slippery flesh slipped through his hands and Harper sank down, gasping for air and leaning against the back of the shower. Harper’s eyes were almost black, just a thin rim of blue around the swollen pupils, Harper’s lower lip was puffy as if he’d bitten it.

"Stand up," Harper said hoarsely. "I want you."

Complete meltdown. Dylan had to lean against the side of the shower stall, and the first touch of that mouth made him bang his head against it and groan. Harper’s hair was slick with whatever he put in it, and he ran his fingers through it, shaped his fingers to the skull beneath. "God, do it."

Harper held on to one hip, gripped the base of him with the other hand and, dear god, either kept talking or hummed, Dylan couldn’t be sure which, but the vibrations of Harper’s tongue and throat were shaking him apart, pulling everything out of him. It was so hard to hold back, to try and make it last, to try and keep from simply fucking Harper’s mouth with primal savagery, but he had to drop one hand to Harper’s shoulder to keep from using his hands to hold Harper’s head in place.

Someone was making helpless, almost obscene sounds, and he rather suspected that someone was him. It started at the top of his head and the base of his spine and when the two spikes of energy met, he tilted his head back and roared in surrender and victory and came hard enough that he thought for a moment he was going to pass out.

When he could breathe again, he was sitting on his ass in the shower and kissing the life out of Harper, tasting himself and Harper at the same time. Harper was a very nice lapful, and seemed to be surprised to be kissed, but definitely enthusiastic. He pulled that delightful ass closer with both hands and kept kissing, even though the hot water did seem to be running out.

What the hell, they had their own heat, and with his tongue halfway down Harper’s throat, he scarcely noticed, at least until it got cold enough to raise gooseflesh on both of them.

Harper finally pulled away, panting. "We better get out."

"Yeah," he agreed, but couldn’t seem to make himself move. Harper peeled himself off and got up, turned the tap off and looked at him uncertainly. "Give me a hand," Dylan said and held one of his up.

Harper took it, he made it to his feet and damned if he didn’t want to kiss Harper again. So he did, hoisted Harper up and Harper put both arms around his neck and then he had Harper against the side of the shower, kissing him. "You," Dylan said, between kisses, "Taste. So. Damn. Good."

Harper, reduced to wordlessness again, whimpered.

It was helpful to know how he could reduce Harper to wordlessness, but somehow he didn’t think he could use this method on command deck.

Harper nipped at his jaw, tightened his arms around Dylan’s neck. "I’ve got a bunk." Huskily.

It was official now, his brain shorted out. He got both hands under Harper’s ass and simply carried him out of the shower, both of them dripping, found his way to Harper’s bunk by vague memory and then Harper was underneath him, squirming and wriggling in a way that Dylan liked. A lot.

He was breathing hard again, and, God, Harper was a very nice package. Especially naked. Particularly naked. He lifted himself with his hands, surveyed the bounty beneath him and dove in, intent on exploring every little bit of it. Harper seemed perfectly happy about this, except he also seemed determined to return the favor, which was exceedingly hard to resist even if it meant Dylan ended up on his back with a very focused Harper straddling him.

"Why is it you look bigger with your clothes off?" Harper asked hoarsely.

Dylan closed his fingers around Harper’s cock. "You look bigger, too," he told Harper slyly and stroked upward.

Harper bit his lip, eyes half-closed. "I want you bad." A whisper, like a confession.

Dylan pulled Harper down, licked his way into a kiss and pressed his hips up against Harper’s. "Fuck me," he said, into Harper’s mouth.

Harper shuddered. "No, me." Weakly.

Dylan nipped Harper’s lower lip. "I asked first."

A breathy chuckle. "Is that an order?"

Dylan stilled for a moment, kissed Harper again, stroked a hand down the back of Harper’s neck. "Not rank, seniority." 

Harper gave him a long look and a smile he’d never before seen on Harper’s face. "Okay."

Christ, he’d already come once and now his bones felt like they were melting. Harper found something in a tube, something slick and cool, and Dylan took in a deep breath, let himself be opened. Harper’s lips traveled from his navel to his hip and then across to his cock. Even with the edge off, it was... incredible. He let his legs fall open, and Harper knelt between them, murmuring something inaudible into his skin. Harper was ridiculously careful, and Dylan finally put his hands in Harper’s hair. "Now, not next week."

Harper turned his head, bit Dylan’s wrist gently. "Let go, and you’ll get it." Huskily.

He obeyed, felt the stretch and burn, and Harper’s eyes went distant and glazed. He hooked his legs around Harper, pulling him in and, god, sensation between pain and pleasure and Harper’s slippery fingers grasped him, tipping it over into pleasure. Too long, too long, and he moved, pushed into that heat and groaned, rocked up again, thrusting into Harper’s fist.

It didn’t last as long as he’d have liked, but Harper’s expression had something to do with that, lost and dazed and focused, and being on the receiving end of that focus was the hottest thing he’d ever known. Harper came first, with a groan and hard thrust, and that tipped Dylan over a moment later, and then they were collapsed in a messy, affectionate tangle of arms and legs with Harper rubbing his palm over Dylan’s chest again and again.

"I need a nap," Harper murmured into his chest.

Dylan let his eyes close. Took in a deep breath. "So take one." Muzzily, and he tightened his arms around Harper.

"You, too." 

"Plan on it." He stroked Harper’s back happily, eyes still closed. This moment couldn’t last forever. The Andromeda would arrive sooner or later and then he’d have to figure out what he’d done, if it had damaged things or if it could continue, because right now, he didn’t much favor the idea of his usual sterile life as captain. He shifted, tugged Harper up a bit and rubbed his chin on Harper’s hair. "Sleep."

"Mmmmmhmmmmm." Harper’s body was already going lax.

He let go then himself, comforted by the weight and warmth on top of him.

  


* * *

Beka met them at the hangar deck. "What happened? Why were you guys here early?"

Too aware of Harper beside him, Dylan shrugged. "Ran into some, uh, trouble." He’d woken up to find that Harper was back in the shower; he’d taken another himself after Harper had emerged and Harper had seemed disinclined to talk. Harper hadn’t been disinclined to kiss, though; Dylan’s mouth was still tingling.

"Got arrested," Harper put in, "Got out, got back to the Maru, and here we are." 

"You got arrested?" Beka shook her head, smiling. "Can’t let the two of you go anywhere."

In fact, Dylan thought distantly, his lips weren’t the only thing tingling. 

"Well, don’t look at me, he was the one who kept talking about the Commonwealth," Harper protested. "I wasn’t doing anything wrong."

Beka arched an eyebrow at Dylan. "They didn’t like the Commonwealth?"

"Sedition," Dylan said and gestured vaguely. 

"Dylan got thumped in the head," Harper said helpfully.

Beka frowned. "Are you all right?"

He gestured again. "Fine, fine." His mind was still elsewhere, it was a little hard to focus on Beka’s concern.

"Are you sure?" She was regarding him narrowly.

"Just tired," he said hastily. "It was a long night."

"Oh, yeah," Harper agreed feelingly.

Beka’s gaze switched to Harper.

"We had to hike through a goddamn wilderness to get back to the Maru," Harper added, "I got a blister."

Beka snorted and shook her head. "Well, get some rest then, both of you. Tyr’s about ready for me to relieve him."

Dylan nodded absently. "Good idea."

Beka gave him another long look, frowned slightly. "Maybe you should stop by med-deck."

"No, I’m fine, I’m fine. Didn’t even lose consciousness, just a bump, and you’re right, I just need to get some rest." He looked sidelong at Harper, found Harper was looking sidelong at him. "Thanks, Beka."

She didn’t seem convinced, but finally left them at the juncture of a corridor.

He looked at Harper and rubbed his chin. He’d occasionally regretted his height and breadth, of course, and now he was regretting it again. He didn’t want Harper to feel... intimidated. "So, uh, would you, um...."

Harper looked at him. Gave him that startlingly sweet smile again. "Definitely."

Well, so maybe it wasn’t so bad after all.

He wondered if Harper would be up for a field trip again any time soon.

*****THE END*****


End file.
